Rhythmus (2023) Printmaking by Wolfgang Petkewitz

Born in Hamburg in 1954, after completing a commercial apprenticeship, I studied theology and sociology. Even during my studies, my focus was on the conditions under which interpersonal communication takes place. I did my doctorate on the question of how interaction processes are changing under the conditions of increasingly mediated communication. The desire to express this visually also led me to painting. In addition to my work, primarily in the field of education and especially in adult education, after several years of courses with Thomas Freund, among others, I studied painting at the Free Art School in Cologne from 2020 and discovered woodcuts as my form of expression.

I am particularly interested in the city and the people living in it. How do people shape their environment - and how does the environment shape people? Travel sketches became pictures, pictures became woodcuts. This oldest form of printmaking forces me to reduce things to the essentials: the interaction of people with their living environment. Working with wood is particularly appealing because the material plays an important role in the creative process. The material's own life leaves room for surprises; with all the systematic work that woodcutting requires, there is always this element of the unpredictable.

I have been working as a freelance artist since 2023. I don't see myself as a graphic artist, but I want to use woodcuts to 'paint' pictures that make people's feelings for the places where they live visible.

• Nationality: GERMANY
• Date of birth : 1954
• Artistic domains: Works by professional artists,
• Groups: Professional Artist Contemporary German Artists